Fascinating Facts You Never Knew About the Human Body

Our bodies are amazing and overall so resilient. There are so many fascinating facts about the human body, and these are some you never knew. 

There’s a Name for Your Hungry Tummy

You know, that sound your stomach makes when it’s really hungry. To me it sounds like it’s eating itself. Anyhow, it has a name, Borborygmus. The International Foundation for Gastrointestinal Disorders says that it’s a technical term for the gurgling sound that comes from the fluid and gas moving around in the intestines. 

We’re Hairy, Like Chimpanzee Level Hairy

Or more specifically, we are as hairy. “Per square centimeter, human skin has as many hair follicles as that of other great apes.” So we do indeed have the same number of hairs as chimps, though our hair is much thinner. Thus our hair is harder to see and has less volume. 

We Are Taller in the Morning,  Shorter at Night

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, I am for sure taller in the morning than I am at night. Working a classic schedule makes this the most noticeable. When you get into the car to start the day, your rear view mirror will need to be adjusted from the night before, and at the end of the day again, because you are shorter by then. The thing is, all day we are putting pressure on our joints. Throughout the day, the cartilage in your spine is compressed and although it’s by just fractions of an inch it does push everything down. Then through the night as you sleep, your body naturally relaxes and eases the pressure on your spinal disks and you will return into your full height. 

Your Liver Can Regrow Itself, Almost Entirely

When you see a medical show and a patient needs a liver, sometimes they just get a partial liver. Why? Well, this reason precisely. Even a 25% piece of a liver can regrow to normal size. Liver cells have rapid replication and therefore they can regrow a liver close to if not its original full size, all within about a month. This is easily one of the most fascinating facts.

Babies Are Born Without Kneecaps

Crazy, right? How can this be? The cartilage around the knee gradually turns into bone between the ages of three and six years old, during the ossification process. Then, the knees still aren’t fully finished growing until young adulthood. 

Your Fingers Don’t Have Any Muscles 

We use them all day and they are pretty necessary to many tasks, but our fingers themselves don’t have any muscle in them. They have a strong grip to allow you to open tightly closed lids, doors, and other things but their “strength” doesn’t come from the use of muscles. The movement within your fingers comes from tendons and bones, with a lot of help from the muscles in the palms of your hands and at the base of each individual finger.

The Way You Sit Affects Whether You Remember Positive or Negative Memories

Sitting and looking downward makes it easier to recall negative memories, while sitting upright and looking upward allows you to more easily recall positive, and empowering memories. So, sit up and look up!

Your Intestine is Really Long

Like four times as long as you are. It’s about 18 to 23 feet long. If you uncoiled it, it would stretch to almost four times the length of your body. 

Your Pinkie is Really Important

It may seem like a throwaway finger, I mean what does a pinkie even do? However, your pinkie is crucial when it comes to hand strength. It also helps the thumb to pinch, and gives more power to your ring, middle, and index fingers, too.  Hand Therapist, Laurie Rogers, from the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Washington says that losing your pinkie would mean that, “You’d lose 50 percent of your hand strength, easily.”

Humans Are the Only Animals That Cry

It’s true, other animals produce tears as lubricants for their eyes, but we as humans are unique. We are the only ones who cry as an emotional response. It has been suggested that tears server as a social purpose for humans and that, “Even for those who think they really are just weeping for nobody apart from themselves, it’s still a sort of performance. You’re showing yourself things have really got bad, or whatever it might be.”

There are so many more fascinating facts about the human body that you don’t know. Make sure to watch for a part two, and more fun and fascinating facts!